Moonlight Road by Robyn Carr Read Free Book Online

things the hardest way I can.”
    Tonight, sitting on her sofa, listening to them murmur on the deck, the image of Ian running his big hands over Marcie’s round belly emblazoned on her mind, she thought, I will never have that. What I’m going to have from now on is what I have right now—myself. Just myself. Oh, there will be family—Marcie and Drew won’t forget me. We’ll talk and there will be visits. But I will never have what they have. I had better learn to find value and appreciation in this, because this is what I have….
    I am alone. And I’d better learn how to be that .

    Ian was washing up breakfast dishes the next morning when he said to Erin, “You get your phone and satellite feed today, right? So you’ll have TV, Internet, et cetera?”
    “Hopefully. It was supposed to be done before I moved up here, but they rescheduled a couple of times.”
    “The minute you get hooked up, give us a call. All right?”
    Erin smiled at him. “Sure, Dad.”
    “How’s the head?”
    She touched the Band-Aid at her hairline. “Funny looking.”
    “That’s nothing to when Marcie burned off her eyebrows. Now, that was funny looking. Doesn’t hurt anymore? Any headache?”
    “I’m fine. You can go. It’s all right.”
    “When you get the laptop online, are you going to e-mail your office and tell them so they can send you work?”
    “No. I brought the computer so I can research if I feel like exploring that book idea, but mainly I want to try my hand at total relaxation. I’ve never had the luxury before. This is my time and I’m going to—”
    “If you get bored or lonesome,” he said, cutting her off, “just come back to Chico. We’ll all take some long weekends up here, together. All your hard work on making this place nice won’t go to waste.”
    “I won’t get bored or lonesome,” she said emphatically. “I’ve been looking forward to this all year. But if I do, you’ll be the first person I call.”
    “You do that, Erin,” he said.

Three
    A fter a long day of hiking along the ocean, Aiden went home, showered and walked down the path to Luke and Shelby’s house at around dinnertime. He found Shelby in the kitchen, getting some dinner ready. He ponied right up. “Can I help?”
    “You can set the table,” she said. “But first, there is a call for you on the machine from a guy named Jeff. I wrote the number down, but go ahead and listen to the message if you want.”
    “Nah, I’ll just call him.” He went to the cupboard to pull out the dishes.
    “Ah, Aiden, you might want to call him now. Set the table after.”
    “Why?” he asked. He’d kept in touch with Jeff since undergrad days; they’d both been in ROTC and on navy scholarships for med school. Jeff was one of the few people besides his brothers he was in constant touch with.
    “It’s something urgent,” she said, her back to him, stirring a pan on the stove. “Something to do with an Annalee Riordan.” She turned toward him. “I know you don’t have any sisters.”
    He was stunned speechless for a second. Then he recovered and smiled. “The ex,” he said. “You’re right, I’ll call.”
    When he got Jeff on the phone, he was informed that Annalee had been looking for him unsuccessfully. His mother’s Phoenix phone was disconnected, all the brothers had moved, Aiden had separated from the navy and was now a civilian. The only one she could round up was Aiden’s former frat brother/best friend/best man and currently lieutenant commander in the navy. “She says it’s urgent that she speak to you,” Jeff said.
    “We’ve been divorced for eight years after a three-month marriage,” Aiden said. “We don’t have urgent issues.”
    “Maybe you should respond,” Jeff said. “You can hang up on her after you decide she’s making excuses.”
    Aiden looked over his shoulder at Shelby. “I’m telling you, we don’t have business. We don’t have mutual friends or family, we don’t have property,